Antisemitism after the Bondi massacre

More online: The left's duty to fight antisemitism

On 14 December 2025, 15 people were shot dead at a Bondi Beach Hanukkah event by two gunmen identified as ISIS-inspired.

Debates continue to rage in Australia on how the Government should respond, who amongst police and intelligence agencies failed to prevent the attack, what does and doesn’t need to be done to stop antisemitism in Australia, and how limits on gun ownership can be made more strict.

The Albanese Labor government had received a controversial report from the Australian Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism (ASECA) in July 2025. Pro-Palestinian groups opposed the report because they saw it inhibiting freedom of speech and protest. Soon after the Bondi massacre, Albanese announced the full adoption of the ASECA plan.

The right-wing LNP Opposition has been strident in proposing other measures, including cutting immigration, especially Muslim immigration, and demanding a national Royal Commission of inquiry. The activist right, including federal politicians, has taken up the anti-Muslim response, and there are many reports of Islamophobic abuse.

The left broadly calls for “social cohesion” and argues that the actions of two Muslim men who were present in the area of the massacre and one of whom disarmed one of the shooters show that the shooters do not stand for Muslims.

Pro-Palestine protest organisers reject the ban by NSW Labor Premier Chris Minns on protests against Israel, arguing that they are not in any way responsible for the Bondi massacre.

So far, so good. But there is too much silence about what could foster a belief in the minds of two men that an effectively suicidal antisemitic attack was virtuous and justifiable.

Time

It is time for the anti-Zionist left to take responsibility for their contribution to fostering antisemitic attitudes. The boycott of “Zionism” and “Zionists” spills readily over into antisemitism. The result of the cultural and academic boycott of Israel is that many Jewish people have been ostracised and shunned in progressive circles. This political culture is not the cause of the attacks at Bondi. But it creates a social milieu in which anti-Zionism flourishes and on its fringes is readily translated into antisemitism.

I don’t trust governments to protect free speech and take genuine action against the antisemitic attitudes and beliefs that can lead to exclusion, hate speech and violence. Community attitudes can be changed by grassroots action, including community building, identifying precursors to antisemitism, and by vigorous resistance to antisemitic behaviour and its precursors.

It is preposterous that Friends of Standing Together are ostracised at pro-Palestinan rallies in Sydney, whilst antisemitic flags, slogans, and participants go unchallenged. The designation of the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023 as an act of resistance is to endorse military attacks on Israelis and Jews as legitimate. The pro-Palestinian movement leaders could instead specifically make welcome all supporters, regardless of their views on Zionism, reject the cultural and academic boycott of Israel, and offer to support Jewish individuals who come forward with complaints that they have been targeted for ostracism or exclusion by supporters of Palestinian liberation.

We can better resist the imposition of repressive measures by committing to taking our own measures for change.